|
|---|
Mr Copland ;)
United Kingdom
| | (Natami Team Member)
Posts 452
27 Sep 2009 16:18
| @Thomas
Hey Thomas the new photos in the hardware section look excellent! :)Andy
| |
Joe M
Norway
| |
Posts 164
27 Sep 2009 16:38
| Dag Jacobsen wrote:
|
What I really meant was that how will the fact that most old games are 4:3 screen format and not 16:9 or 16:10 be handled ? Most LCD computer screens have no facility for changing this.. So the image will be stretched :-(
|
I guess we maybe will have to connect the Natami to a CRT monitor, CRT TV or a LCD/Plasma TV to get the perfect picture? It was a setback when LCD monitors replaced CRT monitors. Their fixed resolution really sucks. I would simply have gotten my hands on a good CRT monitor for use with the Natami. You can get them almost for free these days. Of course I hope Thomas has made a workaround for the 16:9/4:3 issue. Maybe it could be possible to integrate an option for this into the early start up control.
| |
Fabian Nunez
USA
| |
Posts 282
27 Sep 2009 20:20
| Widescreen monitors are a reality we can't get away from - if the team tells people that they have to get hold of another monitor just so their games don't look stretched they're going to look completely incompetent. There's already a solution to that problem, that has been used for years - it's called pillarboxing. You basically take the 3:4 image and center it horizontally in the 16:9 screen, so that you have two black "pillars", one on either side. In the context of natami, that means having extra fat vertical borders. If no such register already exists, all the team needs to do is to add a register that sets the width of the vertical borders, and have an extra parameter in the monitor definition file that says "this is for a widescreen monitor". If natami supports reading the DCC data channel from monitors (if the team wants to market natami to video buffs it really needs to), it can itself ask the monitor for this info and change the width of the border automagically.
| |
Thomas Hirsch
Germany
| | (Natami Team Member)
Posts 233
27 Sep 2009 21:01
| @Dag OK, now I understand what you mean. It would be a kind of emulation mode for 4:3 on 16:9 resolution. In theory it is possible quite easy. But we need to take care of the timing. But it is a good hint. Because I do not like 16:9 screens I do not have such a monitor. So I never thought about it. For the hardwired modes (OCS) there need to be an emulation/promotion/scandoubling nevertheless. And, you are right there obviously need to be two targets. 4:3 AND 16:9. The 4:3 comes first, the 16:9 will follow later, when the system runs stable. If I should forget it please write a bugreport then ;-)
| |
Gunnar von Boehn
Germany
| | (Natami Team Member)
Posts 3727
27 Sep 2009 21:05
| How does Windows handle this? How do all the Windows game in 640x480 / 800x600 or 1024x768 look on a 16/9 monitor?
| |
Fabian Nunez
USA
| |
Posts 282
27 Sep 2009 21:22
| In my limited experience, windows games seem to just stretch the image. Playing devils advocate though, if you have a wide screen and the game provides 1024x600 and 1280x800, and you still ask for 1024x768, if the image is squished you literally asked for it :)
I think this is one place where natami can actually be ahead of wintel, using pillarboxing at the system level so as not to distort the picture. IIRC natami was going to have a DVI plug; if so it will always have access to DDC information from the monitor (DDC is mandatory in DVI) and can adjust the border width transparently.[Edit] Heh, I see that OS4 has just now gotten support for DDC :)
| |
Team Chaos Leader
USA
| | (Natami Team Member)
Posts 1199
27 Sep 2009 22:14
| I have had a widescreen monitor for 1.3 years now.
I watched my brother play several games on it (XP)... none of them ever looked squished.
And when I run AmikitOS on the same puter/monitor, everything looks exactly as it is supposed to.I suspect whoever is complaining about squished stuff either has something set wrong or bought a defective LCD monitor.
| |
Marcel Verdaasdonk
Netherlands
| |
Posts 2089
27 Sep 2009 23:24
| Keep in mind some monitors stretch a image themselfs.
I have 2 LG flatron's i have a button on the screen to switch between 4:3 and 16:9.
| |
Team Chaos Leader
USA
| | (Natami Team Member)
Posts 1199
27 Sep 2009 23:37
| My monitor has an OS with menus and a zillion options. It has various stretching options, zooming options, etc. I have stretching off.
| |
Fabian Nunez
USA
| |
Posts 282
28 Sep 2009 01:02
| Team Chaos Leader wrote:
|
I have had a widescreen monitor for 1.3 years now.
I watched my brother play several games on it (XP)... none of them ever looked squished.
And when I run AmikitOS on the same puter/monitor, everything looks exactly as it is supposed to.
I suspect whoever is complaining about squished stuff either has something set wrong or bought a defective LCD monitor.
|
Right, but the game depends on the user to set the resolution correctly. I'm pretty sure that, unless you have a monitor that corrects it for you, if you ask for a 3:4 mode and you have a 16:9 screen you'll get distortion.
| |
Team Chaos Leader
USA
| | (Natami Team Member)
Posts 1199
28 Sep 2009 01:36
| Your computer either outputs a 4:3 mode or it does not. If your computer outputs a 4:3 mode and your monitor changes it without your permission then that is a bug in your monitor.
but the game depends on the user to set the resolution correctly.
|
I don't know what you mean by that. Any resolution the user sets inside a game is correct isn't it?
| |
Team Chaos Leader
USA
| | (Natami Team Member)
Posts 1199
28 Sep 2009 01:41
| If I set my Amiga desktop to output a 1280x1024 display I get a 1280x1024 display on my digital monitor. There is no stretching. Unless I turn on stretching inside the monitor.
If I set my bgcpc desktop to output a 1280x1024 display I get a 1280x1024 display on my digital monitor. There is no stretching. Unless I turn on stretching inside the monitor.
I have a very large border on each side of my "1920x1080p" monitor and a tiny border on the top and bottom when displaying a 1280x1024 screen.
| |
Fabian Nunez
USA
| |
Posts 282
28 Sep 2009 03:35
| Team Chaos Leader wrote:
| | Any resolution the user sets inside a game is correct isn't it? |
Depends - if you like seeing everything stretched out horizontally then yes. Otherwise a correct resolution would be one that has square pixels so the game's images are a correct reflection of what the game's designers intended.
| |
Fabian Nunez
USA
| |
Posts 282
28 Sep 2009 03:37
| Team Chaos Leader wrote:
|
I have a very large border on each side of my "1920x1080p" monitor and a tiny border on the top and bottom when displaying a 1280x1024 screen.
|
Then congratulations - your monitor is being smart about this problem and fixing it using pillarboxing (the very large borders). My HDTV and my XBox 360 do the same. However, neither the monitor I have at work nor the one in front of me right now do this (both monitors are 22" Samsung Syncmasters, my HDTV is also a Samsung bought last year).[edit] Actually, it looks like my monitor at home can be set to pillarbox after all - it's just not the default behavior. I wonder why not?
| |
Team Chaos Leader
USA
| | (Natami Team Member)
Posts 1199
28 Sep 2009 03:49
| My HDTV is a Samsung also. It displays correctly.
| |
Dag Jacobsen
Norway
| |
Posts 47
28 Sep 2009 11:52
| Gunnar von Boehn wrote:
|
How does Windows handle this?
How do all the Windows game in 640x480 / 800x600 or 1024x768 look on a 16/9 monitor?
|
They suck ;-)
Atleast the ones who dont have a widescreen option , I have to say they are not many recent games who dont have a 16:9 or 16:10 resolution as an option, but Ive tried SimCity4 on my 16:9 and its stretched so its not as good as a normal aspect ratio.
Btw widescreen monitors are also 16:10, but more and more is now 16:9 as the LCD-Tvs. LCD TVs I would expect fix this mostly, but LCD monitors, atleast mine, are possibly less likely to have autopillarboxing. Mine is a BenQ 24" about a year old.
If more than some monitors do pillarboxing automatically I might be off here, but I just know ive been frustrated a bit due to this in games where I do not have a 16:9/16:10 resolution option, sure on PC this is less and less common now, but I just thought since all Amiga games of olde are 4:3 - there could be a good idea to add, as someone say, an early startup option for the type of monitor used.
Either a 16:10 or 16:9 screen, or default 4:3.If this turns out to be a non problem, good - but lookout :-D
| |
Golem X
| |
Posts 45
28 Sep 2009 12:11
| Fabian Nunez wrote:
|
Team Chaos Leader wrote:
|
I have a very large border on each side of my "1920x1080p" monitor and a tiny border on the top and bottom when displaying a 1280x1024 screen.
|
Then congratulations - your monitor is being smart about this problem and fixing it using pillarboxing (the very large borders). My HDTV and my XBox 360 do the same. However, neither the monitor I have at work nor the one in front of me right now do this (both monitors are 22" Samsung Syncmasters, my HDTV is also a Samsung bought last year).
[edit] Actually, it looks like my monitor at home can be set to pillarbox after all - it's just not the default behavior. I wonder why not?
|
Because the majority of customers would complain that their monitor isn't fully utilized? The same thing applies to television - AFAIK most devices default to stretching
| |
Christian Kummerow
Germany
| |
Posts 171
28 Sep 2009 12:11
| Team Chaos Leader wrote:
|
If I set my Amiga desktop to output a 1280x1024 display I get a 1280x1024 display on my digital monitor. There is no stretching. Unless I turn on stretching inside the monitor.
If I set my bgcpc desktop to output a 1280x1024 display I get a 1280x1024 display on my digital monitor. There is no stretching. Unless I turn on stretching inside the monitor.
I have a very large border on each side of my "1920x1080p" monitor and a tiny border on the top and bottom when displaying a 1280x1024 screen.
|
You talk about TFT or CRT?
If TFT, can it too display 640x512 at 1280x1024 with 1:1 pixelmapping? And Zoom?
Exact Model Number please :)
I never seen a TFT that can do this. Maybe it posible to quad/double
the pixels by Hardware to get not such a typical sick picture of TFTs?
| |
Claudio Wieland
Germany
| | (Natami Team Member)
Posts 364
28 Sep 2009 12:16
| Thomas Hirsch wrote:
|
@Dag
OK, now I understand what you mean. It would be a kind of emulation mode for 4:3 on 16:9 resolution. In theory it is possible quite easy. But we need to take care of the timing. But it is a good hint. Because I do not like 16:9 screens I do not have such a monitor. So I never thought about it.
For the hardwired modes (OCS) there need to be an emulation/promotion/scandoubling nevertheless. And, you are right there obviously need to be two targets. 4:3 AND 16:9.
The 4:3 comes first, the 16:9 will follow later, when the system runs stable. If I should forget it please write a bugreport then ;-)
|
Hello Thomas Maybe you could add a special button to the system, so that people can arbitrarily switch on 4:3 pillar boxing on 16:9 screens? It seems to me that this would be the most simple solution. If someone wants to play an old game, switch the button and voilà :) . The hardware handles that accordingly and inserts sufficient black screen space during display.
| |
Erik Bauer
Italy
| |
Posts 227
28 Sep 2009 12:30
| Seems a fair solution
| |
|
The team will post updates and news here